1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates generally to engineering workstations used for testing or setting up tests for electronic devices. More particularly, embodiments of the invention relate to self-contained, liquid cooled engineering test stations that meet OSHA requirements and can be used in an office environment.
2. Description of Related Art
Product life cycles are rapidly shrinking and manufacturers are seeing an increased mix of memory devices on test floors and in manufacturing facilities. Very large memory testing systems, roughly the size of a small automobile, requiring industrial power of over 200 volts are presently operating on test floors and in manufacturing facilities. These large memory testing systems use programs, written by test engineers, to test memory devices, such as flash memory devices, on or off a wafer before the memory device is sold to a customer.
When a new memory device is created, a test engineer must create a test program for testing the new memory device on the large memory testing system. The test engineer must use the large, expensive test system to prepare and test the new test program. The test engineer goes to the product manufacturing or test area to use the large test system to generate a new test program for the new part. This stops production and testing of other parts and devices on the product line.
Furthermore, it is difficult to write and troubleshoot a new test program on a large system because accessibility to manual probing of a device under test is difficult in a large system that is meant to test multiples of devices at the same time.
What is needed is a smaller testing device or engineer workstation that can be used and operated in an office environment where design and test engineers work. The engineer workstation should be portable so it can be moved from office to office. It would also be useful for the engineer workstation to use the same protocols and software as the large testing systems so that programs developed and created by a test engineer are compatible on both systems.